The present invention relates to consumer apparatus operation management systems and methods for adjusting the demand and supply of electric power of consumer apparatus so as not to depart from a specified voltage of a power distribution system.
In the recent technology development of demand side management, services are under consideration in which distributed energy sources to be regulated are integrally managed, rendered to trade the electric power with a system side through, for example, buying and selling surplus electric power and/or adjusting the load amount, and operated as a virtual power generating plant. It is also discussed that the operation of services is performed by a third party other than a power system operator, and a company that performs the operation is called an aggregator. Target distributed energy sources may be originated to the integration of emergency generators and/or compact hydraulic powers in old times, and recently the target apparatus have been expanded to consumer apparatus for reasons of development of the communication technologies. The examples of the target consumer apparatus include a distributed power source to serve as the supply source of electric power, a heat pump and/or an air-conditioner to serve as a load, and further an electric vehicle, a rechargeable battery, and the like that may serve as both the supply source and the load.
JP-A-2012-095466 could be listed, for example, as a background of the field of the present technology. It describes an apparatus which continues to sell the power generated by distributed power supplies while suppressing a voltage rise in a power distribution line caused by the distributed power supplies, the apparatus including a unit which stores an allowable upper voltage limit value that is the upper limit of the allowable range of the voltage in the distribution line, a unit which acquires, from voltmeters installed at various sites of the distribution line, voltage values measured at the respective sites, and a unit which instructs a water heater linked up with the distribution line to heat water when at least one of the acquired voltage values is higher than the allowable upper voltage limit value.